From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
Noah didn't think twice before grabbing Maeve's hand, his other grabbing the compass, to take her home. Deimos moved off in a flurry of wings, the Taliesens moved off slowly and on their own feet, and Delphia moved back into the ether in which she found herself so comfortable.
The transaction was wordless, but as they stood in the Nightshade's court, Noah kissed her forehead gently, pulled his invisibility cloak over himself, and used the compass to bring him home.
He came in quietly, still wet from the rain of the Draig. The cold hit him hard and pulled the breath from his lungs. The invisibility cloak did him well, but with the wet he was not sure how long he could stay here. He moved through the streets undetected until he came upon his home. He stood silently and still, frozen in place as his blood ran colder. His home, his family home, where his father and grandfather and grandfather's father had lived, the home his great great grandfather built -- it was but ruins before him. The roof was collapsed in on itself, part of it covered in the unmistakable ice blast of a white dragon, all of it totally uninhabitable.
Cordelia. His mental voice was but a whisper, tentative and hesitant and dry. He was afraid, as his feet finally pulled him to the rubble of the Olson home, there would be no answer. There was so much going on around him, of the other citizens searching for those they loved and trying to get to safety. His home was not the only one in the condition it was. Noah would have swung open the door, if there was one. Instead, he stepped over the broken, shattered entryway and stood in the dark, cold threshold. He pulled his hood down, and this time, spoke aloud, "Cordelia..."
11-19-2022, 02:45 PM (This post was last modified: 11-19-2022, 03:03 PM by Cordelia.)
It was an understandable thing, his fear, doing more damage in the span of a second than the icy breath of the dragon's that came before him could have dreamed of. The Sentinel was given a wide breadth, citizens' steps slowing slightly, eyeing him with a gentle remorse as he steps over the threshold of his ruined family home. News of what had happened the night the fog rolled in, wailing at their gates and how the Shrike abandoned her people spread quickly throughout Halo. She had failed them. She wasn't a hero. She didn't belong to Halo anymore. Not in their eyes.
As such, the Shrike no more was a ghost, moving silently among the people. She keeps her head down, hiding her face, bandaged arm cradled close to her chest in a sling as she floats across the slushy mess of the street. Numb to all that's around her, the feeling of fear that hits her is enough to steal her breath as if she'd been walking across the Sea of Glass only to have it crack open beneath her to plunge her into the icy waters below. The bundle of supplies she's holding with her good arm slips, fumbling to the ground as she makes a pained sound, hazel eyes widening as they begin to water.
She can't see. Not for the tears that blur her vision, freezing in her lashes, lungs aching as she struggles to draw in a breath of freezing air that cuts through her throat like razor blades. "Noah.." Cordelia wheezes, voice carried off by the wind as her feet shuffle forward, catching on the bag of supplies that has spilled at her feet, twisting around her ankles. She grits her teeth, scrambling to get herself free, maintaining her balance out of sheer spite as she rushes towards the broken door frame and braces herself there. "Noah.. I- You're-"
Cordelia
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout the Great War
Noah wasn't sure how long he stood there, but his wet clothes beneath his cloak made his body go numb. It was the numbness he should have felt when he was trapped in the illusion of the Core. Though it was the lack thereof that brought him out of the illusion and gave him the room to save his fellow warriors. Now, though, it was a fear-gripped reminder that losing his father was not the only thing he had to hold grief for anymore.
He couldn't move, even when her voice broke across his eardrums. His glacier eyes had closed, and he had removed the cloak from his trembling body without noticing it. His lips were blue around the edges, his ears and nose a bright, alarming red against the stark white of his cheeks. But it came again, followed by more, and it wasn't a ghost. Sucking in a breath, the Sentinel spun around. His eyes immediately welled with tears as his body carried him to her in spite of the way his muscles trembled in an attempt to keep him warm.
"You're alive." He whispered into her hair, the breath he had been holding spilling out over the crown of auburn. "You kept your promise."
And so whatever Halo thought of her now, it was because of him. He would hold that guilt, he would carry her shame if it meant she didn't have to.
His fears were met with her own worries at the state of him. It wasn’t what she was expecting. There wasn’t blood covering him from head to toe. Only a few dried flecks across his skin and a smattering over his clothes. Nothing marring his perfect features. Nothing except for the cold painting his lips blue at the edges, causing his muscles to tremble and his form to hunch over even as he took long strides towards her, enveloping her in his stronghold of an embrace. Cordelia releases a shuddering breath, shivering despite her layers as the dampness of his own clothes seeps through into her bones, ”I ran away… Only took one shot.”
The shame is palpable along the bone. Acrid and suffocating as it rises in her throat, daring to make her sick all over again even as her one hood hand starts to rub circles against his chest, trying to warm him up. ”The Banshee took one swipe at me and I- I ran away, Noah. I just- I tucked tail and ran.” Sure, she kept her promise. She did what she told him she would, but she desecrated her vow as a hunter. As a protector of Halo and a watcher on the wall. She wasn’t worthy of him. Of this place or these people.
Cordelia might have kept her word to him, but she broke another vow entirely. There were plenty of checks and balances in the world. Rights and wrongs. Just because she held up one end didn’t mean she was a exempt from the other. No, Cordelia was guilty of the highest treason in Halo’s eyes and that wouldn’t change.
Cordelia
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout the Great War
"You stayed alive." His voice was a soft static, cracking with the shivering of his body. He let out a shuddering breath as she rubbed over his chest. The edges of his shoulders and down his pant legs were beginning to frost over. He knew in the logical part of his brain that he needed to get warm and dry, but in the, currently overwhelmed, emotional part of his brain he couldn't move from the spot he was in. "For me." He closed his eyes again and pressed his forehead to hers, and was almost shocked at its warmth contrasted to the numbness that coated him.
Give it to me. Let me carry the burden. He pleaded over the bond, the tears that had welled in his eyes upon seeing her now taking fall over his thick lashes. Noah, too, had once run from a fight he couldn't win. When a dragon and a shakram chased him down, he had fought only enough to draw them away from the Citadel and to get himself to equal safety. Halo had not hated him. It could be argued that the circumstances were different, but Noah wouldn't -- couldn't -- see it that way.
There is too much to focus on. Too much to do. His shivering hasn't lessened and Cordelia can see the frost forming on his clothes, hear the chattering of his teeth, and feel the eye watering cold of his skin as he touches his forehead to hers. She doesn't stop rubbing at his chest even as he crowds into her space, making it difficult to maneuver, his arms a vice around her slender waist. His words are a balm to her wounded pride and while Cordelia wants to argue with him, tempted to push back and say that she owed Halo her life too, she can't find the words.
Instead she draws in a deep breath, pulling back slightly so she can gaze into his red rimmed eyes, blinking back her own tears, "Let's get somewhere warm... Then we can talk." Cordelia murmurs softly, drawing him down for a kiss, her own as hot as embers across his frost covered lips. Her good hands cups his cheek, thumb brushing lightly there before finding his hand, lacing their fingers and allowing him to lead the way.
Cordelia
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout the Great War
He didn't want to leave. He wanted to stay here and take all of her pain and her sorrow and her regret and soak it up like the sponge he had become over the years of his life. But hew would obey her, if only to survive the coming threat of sickness and fristbite.
He grabbed her hand as much as he could, but it was loose at best. He couldn't feel his fingers, nor his hands. Without Cordelia holding on to him, Noah wasn't sure he would be able to detect her to lace his fingers with hers. The only place he knew to go had burned down many, many years ago at the hands of the youngest resident. Despite that, Noah still ventured out into the streets. He passed the Hale's house with its blackened, ice covered remnants of walls and shattered brick foundation. On the other side of that, however, stood the Monster Hunter's Guild.
Stepping inside, Noah didn't do much. He wanted to, but he had lost most of the dexterity of his limbs because of the numbing cold and frost running down his jacket and pants. "There are fire building supplies in here." Noah said, gesturing bunglingly to the right of the fireplace. Being in the warm of the building, despite the hearth being empty, Noah shed his wet clothes. He shook his limbs as he trotted over to the large set of chairs, grabbing the blanket from one of them and wrapping it around himself.
"I'll tell you what happened, if you tell me." He said, trying to lift the corner of his mouth in a smile as he moved back to her side, kneeling down in the blanket before her and the fireplace.
She only pauses their steps to gather up the fallen supplies, grasping it between their two hands as she couldn't hold it with her other, but otherwise allowing him to lead them towards wherever he had in mind. The Monster Hunter Guild comes into view and Cordelia doesn't hesitate to push inside, keeping her side of the bond closed off tight until they're settled, knowing she can't let herself crumple yet. Not yet.
Cordelia doesn't take her eyes off of him as her strips out of his wet clothes, watching him wrap the thick fur blanket around his shoulders, only then does she turn her attention to the hearth. There are still faint embers flickering in the bottom and she grabs a few thinner slivers of wood, carefully stacking them on top in a crisscross pattern to allow it to breathe before exhaling into the low flickering flame. The crackle fills the empty hall as she adds more dry wood to the stack, flames engulfing those too, soon filling the space with warmth that will chase away the numbness that's settled in his limbs.
The Attuned shifts onto her knees in front of him, drawing in a shaky breath as she meets his eyes, feeling that well of shame again as she takes in his gentle expression. "I was in the tower when the wailing started. When it all started..." Cordelia murmurs, recalling the events, telling him all that happened. How the Banshee Queen came and how she only took a single shot before she ran away, leaving Tal and Evie to fend for themselves, how Evie threw herself in front of her. The tears don't stop the entire time she's speaking, sliding down her cheeks in constant tracks of regret, her bad arm clutched tightly to her chest protectively.
Cordelia
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout the Great War
It was only as Noah warmed up beneath the blanket and in the light of the fire that he was able to grasp the whole situation. His mind had been so hyper-focused that he hadn't noticed details that his normal hunter's nature would have caught. The sling that held her arm close to her chest, or the bags beneath her eyes, or the sound of ice cracking beneath her words as she detailed what had happened in Halo.
When she finished speaking, and his body had stopped trembling, he opened his blanket to invite her in. When she was safe against his chest again, Noah felt a warmth prickle through his spine that had been missing. Knowing now what it was, the demigod ignited the magic. The dome covered the whole room, celestial light dazzling over them. Cordelia would feel skin and sinew and muscle come back together, strength to return, and pain to cease.
Taking a deep breath, then, Noah detailed everything for the woman. He spoke of everything he saw, encountered, fought, killed, and how he had brought his friends out of the Core's illusions and how that gave Remi the chance to pull the Core from Caido's chest. He spoke of it all with all of the emotions and terror he had felt, as well as the surge and power that Vi was surely supporting him with during their trials.
"And then...it was just over. And we all just left." Noah said, the weight of the words falling heavy in his lap as his arms pulled the blanket tighter around them.
To be back in his arms was to be home. The one Shrike sinks into his embrace, sagging against his chest as her head is pillowed in the crook of his shoulder and neck, eyes already growing heavy as warmth washes over her. She whispers out a sigh of a breath even as pain flares over her nerves with each little twitch and movement. It's only when he seems to notice along the bond the twinges of pain does he ignite his magic, letting it flare to life in the room, the dome spreading over the entirety of the space.
Muscle, skin, tendon, and sinew knits itself back together. Each little piece growing together until it was whole once more. Her relief is palpable and she sighs heavily, settling in to listen to each thing he has to say, tucking each piece of information away. It was heavy. All of it. How the Core had infected Caido. How they had been thrust into nightmares that only Noah had been able to pull them from. Then just like that it was over. All of them done. The Core destroyed and the Voice gone.
Cordelia lifts her arms to wrap around his neck, holding him more tightly, burying her face against his neck with a shuddering breath. "I'm just glad you're home." She whispers, meaning every word as her eyes squeeze shut, thanking Vi and everyone else that he came home to her. They weren't on the mountain with him, but she doesn't doubt that it was because of Vi's gifts and the other demigods he was able to make it back.
Cordelia
My hand was the one you reached for all throughout the Great War
"Me too." He breathed out, sinking into her embrace. He buried his face in her hair and drew in a long, deep, lung-filling breath. "I never want to part from you again." He said, nuzzling past her hair to the bare skin of her neck. He placed gentle kisses along her throat and down the horizontal length of her collar bone. He pulled the blanket tighter around them, bringing her body close to his. Still naked beneath the blanket, he didn't care. He doubted anyone would be coming to the guildhouse tonight, and it would be safe for them.
With his magic reinvigorating him, Noah got to his feet. He pulled his fiancée with him, but swiftly tucked his arm behind her knees. He carried her upstairs, the blanket falling from his shoulders halfway. Once they reached one of the spare bedrooms the blanket wouldn't matter anyway, and in the comfort of her warmth and embrace Noah couldn't even feel the nip of the cold on his bare skin. Pushing the door to the room open, Noah moved Cordelia to the bed. Turning back after setting his lover down, Noah closed the door. He moved back to her and climbed into the bed.
Now, this may not be going where you expect --
Within moments of curling Cordelia in the curve of his body and wrapping his arms around her, the Sentinel was asleep.
